brought to bear upon individuals, that may, under some circumstances, constitute a justification or excuse for acts otherwise indefensible; but no validity can be given in the courts of this country to acts voluntarily performed in direct aid and support of its unlawful purpose."

Mr. Justice Miller, delivering the opinion of the court, Sprott v. United States, 20 Wall. 459, 464 (1874). The point decided in this case was that a resident of Mississippi, who purchased from the Confederate government a quantity of cotton which was seized by the United States near the close of the civil war, could not maintain a claim under the Captured and Abandoned Property Act of March 12, 1863, 12 Stats. at L. 820, which shut out persons who had given any "aid or comfort to the rebellion." Messrs. Clifford and Davis, justices, concurred in the judgment of the court "solely upon the ground that the purchase of the cotton and the payment of the consideration necessarily tended to give aid to the rebellion, and that all such contracts were void, as contrary to public policy;" and they stated that "they dissented from the residue of the opinion as unnecessary to the conclusion." Mr. Justice Field dissented from the judgment of the court, on the ground that the Confederate government was a de facto government capable of taxing and conveying title to movable property, and that, so far as the question of aid and comfort was concerned, any disability of the claimant in that regard was removed by the President's proclamation of pardon and amnesty of December 25, 1868. The same distinction between the acts of the Confederate government and the acts of the several States that yielded it support is expressed in Williams . Bruffy (1877), 96 U. S. 176, 191-192.

and

All that was meant by the statement, in Thorington v. Smith, 8 Wall. 1, that the supremacy of the Confederate govSequestration ernment "made obedience to its authority in civil confiscation acts. and local matters not only a necessity, but a duty," was that "as the actual supremacy of the Confederate government existed over certain territory, individual resistance to its authority then would have been futile, and therefore unjustifiable. In the face of an overwhelming force, obedience in such matters may often be a necessity, and, in the interests of order, a duty. No concession is thus made to the rightfulness of the authority exercised." Hence the sequestration and confiscation, though enforced by judicial process, under the act of the Confederate congress of Aug. 30, 1861, of a debt due by a citizen of Virginia to a citizen of Pennsylvania, is no answer to an action against the debtor, at the suit of the creditor, after the war, for the recovery of the debt.

Williams v. Bruffy, 96 U. S. 176 (1877).

In April, 1862, certain shares of stock held by loyal citizens of the United States in a corporation in Charleston, S. C., were sequestrated and sold, under a statute of the Confederate congress, as the property of "alien enemies," and new certificates of stock were issued to the purchasers. In February, 1865, the United States forces occupied

Charleston and seized all the property and effects of the corporation, but in May, 1866, restored them on the corporation's replacing on its books the names of the purchasers of the sequestrated stock and their assignees with the names of the original holders and paying to the latter the amount of dividends declared since the beginning of the war. Held (1) that the new certificates gave no title either to the purchasers or their assignees, and should be cancelled, and (2) that the purchasers and their assignees could claim no indemnity from the company. "Nothing is better settled," said the court, "in the jurisprudence of this court than that all acts done in aid of the rebellion were illegal and of no validity. The principle has become axiomatic. It would be a mere waste of time to linger upon the point for the purpose of discussing it. Texas v. White, 7 Wall. 700; Hickman v. Jones, 9 Id. 197; Hanauer v. Doane, 12 Id. 342; Knox v. Lee, Id. 457; Hanauer v. Woodruff, 15 Id. 439; Cornet v. Williams, 20 Id. 226; Sprott v. United States, Id. 459.

"The transactions here in question were clearly within the category thus denounced. The order of sequestration, the sale, the transfer, and the new certificates were all utterly void. They gave no rights to the purchasers, and took none from the loyal owners. In the view of the law, the rightful relations of both to the property were just the same afterwards that they had been before. The purchasers had not then, and they have not now, a scintilla of title to the stock. "The transferees can be no better off than their vendors."

Dewing . Perdicaries, 96 U. S. 193, 195 (1877).

From the numerous decisions of the Supreme Court, beginning with the Prize Cases, 2 Black. 635, and ending with Williams v. Bruffy, 96 U. S. 176, and Dewing v. Perdicaries, Id. 193, the following propositions are plainly

Summary of judicial decisions.

to be deduced:

"1. The district of country declared by the constituted authorities, during the late civil war, to be in insurrection against the Government of the United States, was enemy territory, and all the people residing within such district were, according to public law, and for all purposes connected with the prosecution of the war, liable to be treated by the United States, pending the war and while they remained within the lines of the insurrection, as enemies, without reference to their personal sentiments and dispositions.

"2. There was no legislation of the Confederate congress which this court can recognize as having any validity against the United States, or against any of its citizens who, pending the war, resided outside of the declared limits of the insurrection.

"3. The Confederate government is to be regarded by the courts as simply the military representative of the insurrection against the authority of the United States.

"4. To the Confederate army was, however, conceded, in the interest of humanity, and to prevent the cruelties of reprisals and retaliation, such belligerent rights as belonged under the laws of nations to the armies of independent governments engaged in war against each other; that concession placing the soldiers and officers of the rebel army, as to all matters directly connected with the mode of prosecuting the war, on the footing of those engaged in lawful war,' and exempting them from liability for acts of legitimate warfare.""

Ford v. Surget (1878), 97 U. S. 594, 604, holding that a statute of the Confederate congress could have, as an act of legislation, no force whatever in any court recognizing the Federal Constitution as the supreme law of the land.

"From these cases it may be deduced

"That the transactions between persons actually residing within the territory dominated by the government of the Confederate States were not invalid for the reason only that they occurred under the sanction of the laws of that government or of any local government recognizing its authority;

"That, within such territory, the preservation of order, the maintenance of police regulations, the prosecution of crimes, the protection of property, the enforcement of contracts, the celebration of marriages, the settlement of estates, the transfer and descent of property, and similar or kindred subjects, were, during the war, under the control of the local governments constituting the so-called Confederate States;

"That what occurred or was done in respect of such matters under the authority of the laws of these local de facto governments should not be disregarded or held to be invalid merely because those governments were organized in hostility to the Union established by the national Constitution; this, because the existence of war between the United States and the Confederate States did not relieve those who were within the insurrectionary lines from the necessity of civil obedience, nor destroy the bonds of society, nor do away with civil government or the regular administration of the laws, and because transactions in the ordinary course of civil society as organized within the enemy's territory, although they may have indirectly or remotely promoted the ends of the de facto or unlawful government organized to effect a dissolution of the Union, were without blame 'except when proved to have been entered into with actual intent to further invasion or insurrection;' and,

"That judicial and legislative acts in the respective States composing the so-called Confederate States should be respected by the courts if they were not 'hostile in their purpose or mode of enforcement to the authority of the National Government, and did not impair the rights of citizens under the Constitution.'

"Applying these principles to the case before us, we are of opinion that the mere investment by Hunter, as guardian, of the Confederate funds or currency of his ward in bonds of the Confederate States should be deemed a transaction in the ordinary course of civil society, and not, necessarily, one conceived and completed with an actual intent thereby to aid in the destruction of the Government of the Union. If contracts between parties resident within the lines of the insurrectionary States, stipulating for payment in Confederate notes issued in furtherance of the scheme to overturn the authority of the United States within the territory dominated by the Confederate States, were not to be regarded, for that reason only, as invalid, it is difficult to perceive why a different principle should be applied to the investment by a guardian of his wards' Confederate notes or currency in Con federate bonds--both guardian and ward residing at that time, as they did from the commencement of the civil war, within the Confederate lines and under subjection to the Confederate States.

"As to the question of the intent with which this investment was made, all doubt is removed by the agreement of the parties at the trial that the investment was bona fide, and that the only question made was as to its legality. We interpret this agreement as meaning that the guardian had in view only the best financial interests of the ward in the situation in which both were placed, and that he was not moved to make the investment with the purpose in any way to obstruct the United States in its efforts to suppress armed rebellion. We are unwilling to hold that the mere investment in Confederate States bonds no actual intent to impair the rights of the United States appearing was illegal as between the guardian and ward."

Baldy r. Hunter (1898), 171 U. S. 388, 400.

It appeared in this case that the defendant was appointed guardian of the plaintiff, in Georgia, in 1857. The investment of the latter's Confederate money in Confederate bonds was made in Georgia in 1863, under leave of a local court, granted in pursuance of the act of the Georgia legislature of Dec. 16, 1861, by which guardians were authorized to invest the funds held by them in Confederate bonds. In Lamar . Micou, 112 U. S. 542, the investment of a ward's funds in Confederate bonds was held to be illegal. The court, in Baldy v. Hunter, distinguished that case from the one before them, as follows: "Lamar . Micou was a case in which the guardian, becoming such under the laws of New York, in violation of his duty to the country, and after the war became flagrant, voluntarily went into the Confederate lines, and there gave aid and comfort to the rebellion; and yet he asked that the investment of his ward's money in Confederate State bonds receive the sanction of the courts sitting in the State under the authority of whose laws he became and acted as guardian. Besides, it is distinctly stated in the opinion in that case that the sums which Lamar used in the purchase of bonds of the Confederate States were moneys of the ward in his hands arising either from dividends which he had received in their behalf or from interest with which he charged himself upon sums not invested,' 112 U. S. 476, which is a very different

thing from reinvesting (as in the present case) in Confederate currency [sic] moneys previously received in the like kind of currency. The present case is governed by considerations that do not apply to that case.

We

do not doubt the correctness of the decision in Lamar v. Micou upon its facts as set out in the report."

By section 4, Art. XIV., of the amendments to the Constitution of the United States it is provided that "neither the Confederate debts United States nor any State shall assume or pay any and obligations. debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations, and claims shall be held illegal and void.”

It was held by the mixed commission under Arts. XII.-XVII. of the treaty between the United States and Great Britain, signed at Washington, May 8, 1871, that the United States was not internationally liable for the debts of the Confederacy," or for the acts of the Confederate forces.'

The same principle of non-liability was enforced by the mixed commission under the treaty between the United States and Mexico of July 4, 1868, in respect not only of the acts of the Confederacy, but also of acts of the Zuloaga, Miramon, and Maximilian governments in Mexico.c

66

V. RIGHTS AND DUTIES OF STATES.

1. FUNDAMENTAL RIGHTS AND DUTIES.

$23.

"The ultimate foundation of international law is an assumption that states possess rights and are subject to duties correGeneral summary. sponding to the facts of their postulated nature. In virtue of this assumption it is held that since states exist, and are independent beings, possessing property, they have the right to do whatever is necessary for the purpose of continuing and developing their existence, of giving effect to and preserving their independence, and of holding and acquiring property, subject to the qualification that they are bound correlatively to respect these rights in others. It is also considered that their moral nature imposes upon them the duties of good faith, of concession of redress for wrongs, of regard for the personal dignity of their fellows, and to a certain extent sociability.

"Under the conditions of state life, the right to continue and develop existence gives to a state the rights: